小果海桐 xiao guo hai tong

Shrubs. Young branchlets dark brown after drying, slender, glabrous, sparsely gray-lenticellate. Leaves clustered at branchlet apex, biennial; petiole 5–7 mm; leaf blade pale green abaxially, dark green adaxially, brownish after drying, oblong or oblong-ovate, 3.5–6 × 1.3–2.3 cmleathery, glabrous, lateral veins 7–8-paired, convex abaxially, together with reticulate veins slightly concave adaxially, base cuneate, margin flat, apex acuminate. Flowers not seen. Infructescence terminal, umbellate, 2–5-capsuled. Capsule ellipsoid, 6–8 × 4–5 mm, brown pubescent, dehiscing by (2 or)3 valves; pericarp less than 1 mm thick, not prominently horizontally striate adaxially; pedicel ca. 1 cm, glabrous; stipe indistinct; persistent style 2–2.5 mm. Seeds 9–12, 2–2.5 mm; funicle very short. Fl. Mar–May, fr. Jun–Oct.

Forests, thickets. Guangxi, SE Guizhou (Liping Xian), Hunan, Jiangxi, Zhejiang.

This species has the smallest capsules among the Chinese species that have 3-valved capsules.